Posts Tagged ‘mexico’

I’m back in Buenos Aires but before I return to South America on this blog, I’d like to linger a bit on the way with these photos of Mexico City by Pablo Lopez:

I feel a bit like I’m stalking Sr. Lopez. The day before returning to Argentina I stoped by Rose Gallery in Santa Monica, CA to see if they had any exhibition catalogs from his show there that I could buy. Although they were sold out, the helpful staff showed me a thick stack of his work prints, which was a real pleasure. And just yeseterday, I went to see the exhibit Laberinto de Miradas at the Casa de Cultura, a traveling show, funding by the Spanish government, of Latin American documentary photography. The show’s banner features a child pointing a gun, so I didn’t have a lot of hope for the show but there was a lot of interesting work, including six more photos by Lopez from his Mexico City series.

The aerial photos are amazing, of course, but I think I like the ones on the ground even more. Lopez has a talent for scouting perspectives. The text accompanying the photos mention that the photos take their inspiration from 19th century Mexican landscape painters. I recalled having seen some of those paintings at the Museo Nacional de Arte [MUNAL] in Mexico City. Unfortunately museum’s website doesn’t actually feature any of museum’s art, which is a shame because the paintings are lovely; aerial views of Mexico City when it was a small city and views of Popo and Itza before they became forever obscured by smog. I love that Lopez is taking up this tradition and updating it. I feel like these kinds of works get lost in the sweep of Mexican art, from Aztec calendars to Frida’s mono-brow.

Nicola Okin Frioli is an Italian photojournalist based in Mexico. His series The Other Side of the American Dream depicts people who have been injured and maimed in their attempt to reach the us. It’s a series of expressive portraits against a black background that I feel dignifies the people as well as heightens the attention on their story.

In this photo the plastic chair tells a great deal about the occupant’s circumstances. I confess a certain fascination with these ubiquitous chairs and see them as somehow emblematic of our current age. I’m not the only one. See this post from the New York Times’ Lens Blog, What Has Four Legs and Follows Me?